The present invention relates to the employment of molecular crystals as bactericidal, viricidal and algicidal devices, but more particularly to the molecular semiconductor crystal tetrasilver tetroxide Ag.sub.4 O.sub.4 which has two trivalent and two monovalent silver atoms per molecule, and which through this structural configuration enables electronic activity on a molecular scale capable of killing algae and bacteria via the same mechanism as macroscale electron generators.
The molecular device of this invention is a multivalent silver diamagnetic semiconductor as previously described in my aforesaid pending U.S. application Ser. No. 07/971,933, now U.S. Pat. No. 5,336,499.